That’s another disappointing weekend performance from the Arsenal to mull over. We can talk about the ref who was admittedly bad but we shouldnt be putting ourselves in the position where we have to bemoan the refs performance. Anyway onto the game

The Good

Jack Wilshere – another good performance from the 21 year old Englishman. He is really getting his feet back under him after so long out. Full of running up until the last minute and was always trying to get forward and create chances.

Thomas Vermaelen – assured at the back in the most part today barring a couple of Torres runs. Covered brilliantly on the line to prevent Demba Ba making it 3-1. His best performance in a while.

Kieran Gibbs – MOTM from an Arsenal point of view for my money. Made a lot of tackles and was constantly getting forward and putting decent ball into the box. You can see the ex winger in him when attacking players in the opposition box. Has been one of our best performers so far this season.

Le Coq – gave us a bit of bite in midfield and made some impressive tackles. Fouled nastily by Ramires in the build up to the first Chelsea goal. Taken off injured in the second half, hopefully it wasnt too serious as I would like to see the young Frenchman given more playing time in the next few weeks.

The Bad

Bacary Sagna – played like a man who just wasn’t interested. Some may argue that Walcott doesn’t offer him much cover defensively and while this is true it doesn’t excuse the myriad of misplaced passes. Was very poor going forward today and seemed to be second to almost every ball.

Santi Cazorla – I feel a sense of deja vu here is I think the little Spaniard was in my last bad column too. Made a lovely pass for the Walcott goal but was poor for my money in the rest of the game. He doesn’t seem to suit playing out on the left wing as he is constantly drifting into the middle leading to a real lack of width on the left if Gibbs hasn’t been able to get forward. Could perhaps do with a rest at this stage after his first year without a Winter break.

Per Mertesacker – people hoped that the German would start in the place of Kos given what happened when the German was dropped earlier in the season but he didn’t make much difference today. Lost Mata on a very defendable ball over the top for the Chelsea first and was left for dead by Ba when Chelsea also scored a third. A high line cannot be played with Merte in the team.

The Ugly – The Arsenal bench. With both Poldi and the Ox out of the game due to illness the substitutes bench showed a real paucity of options. The fact that we brought on the practically exiled Arshavin when we were chasing the goal to bring us level in the second tells us and Wenger that he needs to tip his whole foot never mind a toe into the transfer market. We will struggle in games when we have no attacking options to bring off the bench. I still think Giroud can be a top striker for the club but we need a proven top quality goalscorer available if we hope to gain Champions League football via the league this year.

Our next game sees West Ham arrive to the Grove and we really need to gain 3 points from it. I assume the Morrocan Giraffe is ineligible for the game so perhaps we can borrow him back to throw on the bench.

Thats me for tonight, keep the chins up Gooners.

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